


his favorite shape

by mercuryhatter



Category: Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Angels, Angst, Body Dysphoria, Body Horror, Comfort, Demon True Forms, Demons, I mean not 'true' but that's the tag, M/M, Other, Shapeshifting, and getting stuck
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-05
Updated: 2019-03-05
Packaged: 2019-11-12 12:40:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 858
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18011087
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mercuryhatter/pseuds/mercuryhatter
Summary: "I hate having to do that," [Crowley] murmured. "I'm always afraid I'll forget how to change back..."





	his favorite shape

**Author's Note:**

> crossposted from tumblr a while back. there's so much to be done with Crowley's shapeshifting and dysphoria, y'all, I love it.

It was a dark and stormy night, which Aziraphale was finding quite soothing as he read by the fire until he suddenly found it a little too appropriate for his tastes. It began with a resounding thump on his roof, followed by an unnerving amount of thrashing and fluttering. It sounded too large, and like it had too many limbs, to be a fallen bird.

 

Aziraphale bookmarked his book with a sigh and went outside.

 

“Hello?” he called, guiltily directing the rain away from his body. “I’m really not in the mood for any nonsense tonight, so unless this is important--”

 

The shape rolled off Aziraphale’s roof and landed with a _flump_ in his bushes. It had wings (four) and limbs (six). When he first looked, it seemed to be made of jagged black stone, but when he looked again, it seemed more like millions of infinitesimal crawling things, and upon a third look, closer to a mass of sticky ichor. The wings flapped feebly where it fell, and it curled in on itself with a sound that wasn’t really a sound in the physical sense, but one that Aziraphale could perceive easily. It burned his ears a little bit-- or the part of his ethereal self that acted as ears-- but it was also familiar, even if he hadn’t heard it in a long, long time.

 

“Dear, what are you doing looking like this? Are you in danger?” Crowley whined something in the negative. Aziraphale leaned over the bushes to grasp two limbs that were roughly in the right position to help Crowley mostly upright, or at least out of the shrubbery. He wrinkled his nose at the slight burn of a reaction to touching something infernal, but it was muted through his human skin, so he didn’t let go until he had maneuvered Crowley inside. He remembered Crowley being quite graceful at flying in this form, but frankly terrible on the ground, which apparently had only gotten worse with lack of practice. He sprawled awkwardly on Aziraphale’s sofa, wings akimbo. Aziraphale couldn’t remember where the face was meant to be at this form, so, perched on the arm of the sofa (the only free space left for him to sit) he settled for addressing the top right wing.

 

“If you’re not in danger, what are you doing like this? It’s not exactly convenient. Is it even supposed to be on this plane?” Another keening noise, and Aziraphale winced. The noise cut off at his movement and Crowley seemed to be trying to make himself smaller on the couch, wings and limbs winching in a confusing, vaguely non-corporeal tangle.

 

“This isn’t working,” Aziraphale said decisively. “One moment. This may hurt.” He closed his eyes, scrunched up his nose in concentration. His corporation started to leak light and faint, unearthly music. Carefully, he extended the smallest tendril to brush one of Crowley’s wings.

 

Both of them shrieked, but nothing of Earth would have been able to hear them, and after the initial shock they were communicating almost instantaneously. Panic, not his own, flooded Aziraphale, into which he projected all of his calm with significant effort.

 

_I’m stuck I’m stuck I’m stuck I can’t I don’t know I can’t_

 

_My dearest, please calm down, let me help you back_

 

 _I_ can’t _I don’t know I can’t find it Aziraphale_

 

_You don’t need to, give me your trust_

 

_Yes please yes_

 

Aziraphale reached inside the morass of blind panic and twisted molecules, finding the shape that they wanted. There was enough confusion and distress that he had to supplement with some of his own memories, but luckily for the both of them he had spent quite a lot of time gazing at Crowley’s human shapes over the years. He coaxed the cells slowly where they wished to go but were too wild with fear to find. After far more patience than Aziraphale usually expended on anything more complex than a book restoration, Aziraphale blinked his way back onto the physical plane to find that he was holding a human hand in his, attached to a shaking human body. He smiled.

 

“There,” he said, rubbing his thumb soothingly across Crowley’s hand. Crowley gave a slightly hysterical laugh. His yellow eyes flickered nervously. Aziraphale manifested a pair of sunglasses and handed them to him.

 

“Thanksss,” Crowley said, shoving them with more force than necessary onto his face. His mouth twisted and he bit the knuckle of his free hand. He looked wretched in a way Aziraphale wasn’t sure how to address.

 

“What happened?” he asked finally, looking down at their joined hands so he didn’t have to try to parse Crowley’s quickly flickering expressions.

 

“Went to Hell,” Crowley said. “Came back. _Chasssed_ back. Little joke. Got out of, uh, out of hand.” He laughed again, weakly. “It’ssss, _ngh_ ,” he pressed nervous fingers to his mouth briefly, then let them drop, “not important.”

 

“Do you want to come here?” Aziraphale asked quietly. Crowley made a sound embarrassingly close to a whimper in his throat, which caught and became a suppressed sob. Aziraphale shifted off the arm of the couch and drew him close.


End file.
